"This book explores 'efficacious intimacy' as an embodied concept of worldmaking, and a framework for studying belief practices in religious and political domains. The study of how beliefs make and manifest power through their sociality and materiality can reveal who, or what, is considered effective in a particular socio-cultural context. The chapters feature case studies drawn from diverse religious and political contexts in Asia, Africa, and the Americas, and explore practices ranging from ingesting sacred water to resisting injustice. In doing so, the authors analyze emotions and affects, and how they influence dynamics of proximity and distance. Taking an innovative approach to the topic of intimacy, the book offers a fascinating examination of how life-worlds are constructed by material practices. It will be of interest to scholars of anthropology, religion, and material culture"--
This book explores efficacious intimacy as an embodied concept of worldmaking, and a framework for studying belief practices in religious and political domains.
This book explores efficacious intimacy as an embodied concept of worldmaking, and a framework for studying belief practices in religious and political domains. The study of how beliefs make and manifest power through their sociality and materiality can reveal who, or what, is considered effective in a particular socio-cultural context. The chapters feature case studies drawn from diverse religious and political contexts in Asia, Africa, and the Americas, and explore practices ranging from ingesting sacred water to resisting injustice. In doing so, the authors analyze emotions and affects, and how they influence dynamics of proximity and distance. Taking an innovative approach to the topic of intimacy, the book offers a fascinating examination of how life-worlds are constructed by material practices. It will be of interest to scholars of anthropology, religion, and material culture.
Foreword by Jean-Pierre Warnier
Acknowledgments
1. Introduction: Efficacious intimacies of worldmaking
Urmila Mohan
Part I Making the Innermost
2. Inexpressible reading: The efficacious non-discursivity of drinking the
Quran
Hanna Nieber
3. Praying through the hands: Making objects and devotees in Umbanda
Patrķcia Rodrigues de Souza
4. Objects as bodies in Michael Landys Shelf Life
Lindsay Crisp
Part II Techniques and Rituals of Intimacy
5. Tisser du lien: Textile art as a tautological performance and embodiment
of an expression
Claire Le Pape
6. Rituals and riverine flows: Negotiating change in Majuli Island, Assam
Simashree Bora
7. Protective cloaks, enveloping baby carriers: Embodiment and ritual
practice in Angkola Batak Ulos textiles
Susan Rodgers
8. Kokoro-dzukai as a practice of the heart in Japanese Islam and design
Lira Anindita Utami
Part III Intimacies of (Dis)enchantment
9. Intimate with the enemy: Nuclear presence, vernacular art and
Post-Chornobyl transformations Elena Romashko
10. Whats solid about solidarity? Shields and efficacious intimacy in the
2020 protests in Portland, OR
Steve Marotta
11. Grieving as a practice of resistance: Bishnoi entanglements with the
Indian nuclear state
Sonali Huria
12. Pause, pivot and (un)mask in early pandemic U.S.
Urmila Mohan
Afterword
Rose Wellman
Urmila Mohan is an anthropologist of material culture with a focus on embodied belief practices in religious and political contexts. She is the founder of the open-access digital journal The Jugaad Project, collaborates with scholars and educators globally, and is associated with the Matičre ą Penser group. She has researched and theorized materiality, praxis, and aesthetics in diverse contexts including religious communities and maker groups in India, Indonesia, and the U.S.
More info about Taylor & Francis e-books